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[Son of Godzilla]

which kind of contradicts that it's "just semantics" and says that you simply didn't know that the HD part of the industry wasn't doing well.

This is getting dumb. We have financial reports from every major company. There doesn't have to be this argument.

 

[markatisu]

Do you mean lifetime or 1st month. Pretty sure the PS2 MH did more than 300K lifetime.

If it does that 1st month though, that would be decent, but not a patch on a PS360 top 10 list like the other poster seems to think.

300-400k first month is Decent? What would be a successful US launch of a MH game?

 

[Chuck Norris]

... and? It's a game they've said literally 0 about since that interview, we've seen literally 0 media for, and which has a "2010 but obviously not in the first half" release date. Let's go with "Not confirmed for 2010".

Yeah I can't imagine Rockstar ever releasing the first media of a game and then the game itself within a short window of eachother

 

[KuwabaraTheMan]

It doesn't seem to me that Microsoft places the highest priority on "beating" the PS3. They've clearly considered profitability their #1 goal this gen. If they wanted to keep a better lead on the PS3's sales, I would expect that to be fairly easy to achieve by keeping the price gap as wide as possible. But they've been very stubborn with their price reductions. And a glance at their accessory pricing shows that the game division has been directed to stay in the black above all else.

As for your last question, what will happen if they don't reverse the trend? Probably nothing significant. If the PS3 continues its slow crawl to and past the 360's market share, and software sales follow, the 360 will continue to receive just as much support as it does now. When the two have sold 50 million units combined and Microsoft has a 66% market share, that's still far fewer potential customers than when they've sold 100 million units combined and Microsoft has a 45% market share. They're already receiving 90% or more of the same games. That's not going to change by more than a title here and there.

For the most part, that's true. I do think there is one aspect in which market share affects Microsoft's profit margin, however, and that's with Live subscriptions. The larger their market share, the more people there are gaming on the 360 and paying for Live in many cases. As their market share shrinks, potential subscribers may be playing on the PS3 instead.

 

[Pimpbaa]

Hmm, I wonder if Nintendo is going to want to make more games with 2D gameplay of their popular franchises? Also go go ps3. Furthermore booo at the amount of sheeple who bought MW2.

 

[Pseudo_Sam]

Damn. Nintendo should take their profit from December and concentrate ALL of it into the development of Pikmin 3, and just go fucking nuts. I'm talking gold-plated cases, wads of cash stuffed into the manual, and sell it for $1. It would be the biggest selling game ever and would place Pikmin in its rightful place - the top of the heap.

Clearly, it's the only solution.

 

[Nirolak]

Insane.

It's like some kind of inverse curve.

Just watch, many years from now when the Will sells 75,000 units in a month, suddenly Sega will have Bloodfest 7: The Bloodening open at over three million copies sold.

 

[Frenck]

There have to be quite a few, because the CoDs and Halos make a lot of money. It's mostly irrelevant to my argument anyway and is nothing but nitpicking. Also, you also said this in your original post:



which kind of contradicts that it's "just semantics" and says that you simply didn't know that the HD part of the industry wasn't doing well.

Of course it's just semantics because we seem to have a different definition of large scale failure. For you a large scale failure is a game that loses money and for me that's not enough to call a game a large scale failure.

It's pretty easy. If Modern Warfare 2, Halo 3 and GTA 4 are on one end of the spectrum (large scale success) games like Lair, Stranglehold and Bionic Commando are on the other end of the spectrum (large scale failure).

Not every game that makes money, even if it doesn't meet expectations, is a large scale success either or should we count it like that?

 

[grandjedi6]

No it doesn't. How did Resident Evil 4 'blaze its own way'? It was a port of a great game and it was rewarded with sales. Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop was a shitty port of a great game and it was met with horrible reviews and what I assume are pretty bad sales. This isn't a hard concept. Wii owners will buy good games. It's just the sheer number and diversity of the user base that allows a lot of the "casual" games to sell well in addition to that. Unfortunately third parties are fucking retarded.

There are obviously people/gamers who own the Wii who want and go buy big titles. I already mentioned Monster Hunter 3 being a prime example of this but you chose to ignore it.

Well since this is NPD and we're talking in the context of US sales, I really doubt Monster Hunter 3's Japanese sales count as an example. And anyway, one or two examples really doesn't prove your point. Even the Gamecube, which was itself pretty abysmal for 3rd parties, still had a number of exceptions to that rule (like, you know, Resident Evil 4).

You and several other posters keep calling 3rd parties "fucking retarded" and stuff for not following your brilliant plan of "make good game, get money". But its not that simple, no matter how many factors you conviently ignore.

 

[BowieZ]

continuum of quality, a continuum of budget, a continuum of market[ing], a continuum of sales, [and a continuum of profit]

As long as I've been on GAF, and as many fucking Wii/Third Party debate threads I've sat through and read, I've still never seen an actual attempt to compile some sort of solid numbers chart or comparisons table or juxtaposition matrix or ANYTHING, so that we can see the facts clearly and indisputably (although the QUALITY aspect will be less certain, because Metacritic isn't necessarily representative of what is perceived quality by Wii audiences, I should think?), and draw fact-based conclusions, rather than people just going round and round and round in circles spouting off tiny fragments of a debate that is actually reflective of a much larger and more complex picture than people seem to remember at any given time.

 

[OldJadedGamer]

no doubt that PS3 is better hardware, I just prefer the Live experience and typically multiplats run better on 360, and I have established friends that only play on 360.

I very rarely use my PS3, mostly for blu-ray and movie streaming from my computer, but I can see why a newcomer to the HD generation would pick it.

I've been recommending the PS3 to more friends lately. Mostly it's the guys who have HDTV's, don't play games that often like 3 a year maybe and will never go online outside of streaming Netflix. For them, the PS3 is a way better deal than the 360 even with the price difference.

 

[rpmurphy]

Hmm, I wonder if Nintendo is going to want to make more games with 2D gameplay of their popular franchises? Also go go ps3. Furthermore booo at the amount of sheeple who bought MW2.

Kirby Wii?

I hope so. 4-player co-op is a must.

 

[SonOfABeep]

yeah, that may be true.

Just depends on who of their friends they might play with, controller preference, etc.

If blu-ray doesn't matter the price might matter.

 

[Sushen]

For the most part, that's true. I do think there is one aspect in which market share affects Microsoft's profit margin, however, and that's with Live subscriptions. The larger their market share, the more people there are gaming on the 360 and paying for Live in many cases. As their market share shrinks, potential subscribers may be playing on the PS3 instead.

As long as the same multi-platform games sell 2+ on 360 compared to PS3 counterparts, MS will be happy collecting those license fees.

 

[user_nat]

Damn. Nintendo should take their profit from December and concentrate ALL of it into the development of Pikmin 3, and just go fucking nuts. I'm talking gold-plated cases, wads of cash stuffed into the manual, and sell it for $1. It would be the biggest selling game ever and would place Pikmin in its rightful place - the top of the heap.

Clearly, it's the only solution.

Wii Play would probably still sell more.

 

[Firestorm]

I find it funny that Nintendo fans, who bitch about EA, follow the same mindset of EA's CEO (Quality = Sales).

 

[mikekennyb]

Well Nintendo is certainly a very profitable corporation.

 

[donny2112]

Agreed, but objectively the fact remains.

There's nothing objective about metacritic scores. Metacritic scores of Wii games, even less so despite that not being logically possible. :lol

 

[clashfan]

Today is a sad day for gamers...

 

[rpmurphy]

Today is a sad day for gamers...

What happened today?

 

[Rated-Rsuperstar]

Today is a sad day for gamers...

The top 10 list is proof that the Wii is the Gamecube all over again for 3rd party support.

 

[Cipherr]

Errr...are you saying that Nintendo is "gobbling up the pie"? Do you even realise what you're saying means?

Also, do you have a clue about what's "healthy"? Healthy in a market means *making money* and producing stuff that makes money. I think people here seem to expect Microsoft and Sony to subsidize their favourite games for all eternity.

Fun fact: Sony has lost all the money they ever made with the PS1 and the PS2 put together.

Yes, I realize EXACTLY what the hell Im saying when I say Nintendo is gobbling up the pie. Have you seen ANY actual data from this gen? Do you have ANY clue how large a part of the growth they are? By what margin they are the #1 developer in terms of games sold any pretty much any other metric? Im at a loss as to what exactly you are misinterpreting, it is NO SECRET that Nintendo is cleaning how this gen, and they are far and away in the #1 spot worldwide, NOT in just hardware, they are just flat out cleaning house, with the rest of the luckily successful companies fighting over the rest. Now theres still plenty of money for the rest, but Nintendo commands a vast amount of it.

And my definition of healthy is a much more even split than what we have seen. Healthy goes beyond just being profitable. It also takes into account the share everyone involved in the industry is able to take. Your batshit insane if you think the amount of stuidios closing this gen means the industry is healthy, the portions could be spread alot better IMO. And I have no reason to want Nintendo to gain even more than they currently have. A balance as close to 33% on all sides seems that it would benefit me much more than this clusterfuck of nonsense we have going on right now.

Fun fact: Sony has lost all the money they ever made with the PS1 and the PS2 put together.

I dont even know who the heck your directing this at, your the one who called things 'healthy'. Reminding me about one of the big three bleeding from their main artery this gen isnt doing a whole lot to convince me that things couldnt be much better.

 

[Relix]

Today is a sad day for gamers...

Why? I am happy.

 

[yoopoo]

NEW SUPER MARIO BROS. WII WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Nov-09 2.82M
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
ASSASSIN'S CREED II 360 UBISOFT Nov-09 783.1K

Finally hardcore gaming triumphs over non-gaming.

 

[Opiate]

Cumulative year over year sales trends, rounded to the nearest percent:

Wii: -5%
PS3: +22%
360: +0%
DS: +13%
PSP: -35%
PS2: -28%

Year over year winners: PS3, DS
Year over year losers: PSP, PS2
Eh: 360, Wii

 

[Frenck]

NEW SUPER MARIO BROS. WII WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Nov-09 2.82M
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
ASSASSIN'S CREED II 360 UBISOFT Nov-09 783.1K

Finally hardcore gaming triumphs over non-gaming.

You would be all over that non-game if it was on your platform of choice.

 

[Ulairi]

Has bloomberg done their story yet?

 

[Jive Turkey]

Today is a sad day for gamers...

Gonna pour a 40 for your fallen HD homies?

 

[velvet_nitemare]

300-400k first month is Decent? What would be a successful US launch of a MH game?

Yes, it's decent. Those numbers won't wow anybody, nor will they be considered a bomb. Unknown franchises routinely do those kinds of numbers on the 360, so Sonnett's belief that it will compare favourably to a PS360 top 10 is a tad hopeful.

 

[OldJadedGamer]

yeah, that may be true.

Just depends on who of their friends they might play with, controller preference, etc.

If blu-ray doesn't matter the price might matter.

If they don't care about Blu-ray, then I point them directly at a 360 arcade. Like I said the last two friends I advised to get a PS3 their #1 main concern was Blu-ray movies with a game system on the side. They weren't gamers, just wanted the opportunity to maybe rent that new Call of Duty game people have been talking about.

 

[Hero]

Well since this is NPD and we're talking in the context of US sales, I really doubt Monster Hunter 3's Japanese sales count as an example. And anyway, one or two examples really doesn't prove your point. Even the Gamecube, which was itself pretty abysmal for 3rd parties, still had a number of exceptions to that rule (like, you know, Resident Evil 4).

You and several other posters keep calling 3rd parties "fucking retarded" and stuff for not following your brilliant plan of "make good game, get money". But its not that simple, no matter how many factors you conviently ignore.

So what's the best third party offering on the Wii that bombed and deserved better sales in your opinion?

 

[donny2112]

YoYs;

2008

Wii 10,151,000


2009

Wii 9584000

So the Wii was down 5.6% on the year. With all the "doom" and "Wii's bubble is deflating" articles, that's got to be pretty embarrassing for a lot of gaming media.

 

[MonsterHunter]

Err, isn't Nintendo helping Capcom with marketing? The games just aren't that popular in the US.

Yeah it will probably never catch on the way it did in japan.

it doesn't help that it sounds like a colecovision game that uses the concept as the title

"monster hunter"

"cave explorer"

"ocean swimmer"

I wouldn't bet much on MHtri. How they get the game off the ground in the US will depend largely on their marketing, and from what I've seen so far, I don't have much confidence...

You are correct on both counts, but its success in the US needs to be framed properly (which most of GAF won't do)

Personally I think anything above 300-400k in the US would be cause to rejoice given the sales of the series on Western shores.

Slowly but surely the US consumer will come round to Monster Hunter Tri.
My divination reveals lifetime sales will breach 1M.

 

[Zen]

Well since this is NPD and we're talking in the context of US sales, I really doubt Monster Hunter 3's Japanese sales count as an example. And anyway, one or two examples really doesn't prove your point.

Well, if you want to ignore that the situation is perfectly transferable to the western market minus the brand appeal of Monster Hunter.

Even the Gamecube, which was itself pretty abysmal for 3rd parties, still had a number of exceptions to that rule (like, you know, Resident Evil 4).

And Resident Evil 4 sold well on the Gamecube because it was 1) a high quality game, 2) Marketed well, and 3) Was a game people wanted to play. It's not like the type of customer that is receptive to games that have these values never existed on the Wii, due to some magical fairy dust that was sprinkled between generations. It's more like they've been hit over the head with so-so 'test games' given second rate products (in terms of budget, importance, time, marketing (usually none at all) and then pissed on when they object to the fact that they aren't buying products that aren't what they want to play on the Wii.

Meanwhile third parties, with few exception, continue to send games to die, giving them the fraction of time, budget, marketing (being generous) as their other big HD projects, and then say 'See? 'Core games' don't sell on the Wii because our second rate shovelware didn't sell very well and has overtime pushed the core gamer away from the Wii (with the exception of the market for Nintendo specific core games).

You and several other posters keep calling 3rd parties "fucking retarded" and stuff for not following your brilliant plan of "make good game, get money". But its not that simple, no matter how many factors you conveniently ignore.[/QUOTE]

The correct term is actually 'make a game people want to play of sufficient quality and market it appropriately', and it really is that simple. It really is as simple as 'make a game people want to play and put time/money/talent behind it.

Monster Hunter 3, in Japan, had all these things and it sold well.

 

[Sho_Nuff82]

Today is a sad day for gamers...

I'm sure most of GAF can find at least one game they like that sold really, really well in the top 10.

Of all months, you'd think most of GAF would be happy. There's not even any PS360 drama this month, and the Wii is setting all kinds of records.

 

[Brofist]

Slowly but surely the US consumer will come round to Monster Hunter Tri.
My divination reveals lifetime sales will breach 1M.

So it'll do better in the US than Japan :lol

 

[velvet_nitemare]

Slowly but surely the US consumer will come round to Monster Hunter Tri.
My divination reveals lifetime sales will breach 1M.

You're a bigger optimist than i am. Good luck.

 

[Nutter]

Cumulative year over year sales trends, rounded to the nearest percent:

Wii: -5%
PS3: +22%
360: +0%
DS: +13%
PSP: -35%
PS2: -28%

Year over year winners: PS3, DS
Year over year losers: PSP, PS2
Eh: 360, Wii

When the YTD is 2x+ the PS3 even with its +22, -5% isnt even close to being eh. But good for the PS3 its not irrelevant anymore.

 

[Firestorm]

So the Wii was down 5.6% on the year. With all the "doom" and "Wii's bubble is deflating" articles, that's got to be pretty embarrassing for a lot of gaming media.

As of November, it was down 27.8%. I don't think even Nintendo expected to end up down only 5.6%.

 

[Jokeropia]

Sony bragged about selling 3.8 million worldwide during the holidays, and that included US Black Friday sales. :lol

Wii did see a small y-o-y decrease in 2009, but this decrease was notably smaller than the decrease PS2 experienced during it's third year, and despite this decrease, Wii smashed the best PS2 year ever again. Yet I expect gaming "journalists" to have learned nothing,

How much has Mario Kart Wii sold in total?

US: More than 8 million.
WW: Around 20 million. (We'll get updated numbers by the end of January.)

But they did choose to buy a several-year old game.

The real question is if Value Game Pack outsold SMG.

Your crocodile tears for Mario Galaxy are misguided. It sold very well.

Would a normal third person game be playing to the Wii's strengths? Possibly, but also probably not. For example, a hypothetical Resident Evil 4-2 could work really well but at the same time it wouldn't really be using the Wii's strengths outside of minor Wiimote implementation.

Pointer control for third person shooters is in no way "minor". I still say RE4 has one of the best implementations of Wii control, and the game wasn't even originally built for Wii.

So it'll do better in the US than Japan :lol

MH3 will breach 1 million in Japan.

 

[Lord Error]

I think everyone knows why we shouldn't go down that avenue. Sony has a long history, dating back to last decade, of sales-related PR oddities. For example, reporting ship-to-warehouse as sales. Reporting shipments as sales even in non-investment documents where they also use sales as sales. First-party developers reporting wild overshipments as sales. I don't mean to take away from Uncharted 2's success; I really enjoyed it and the way its sales built on the first surprised me in a good way, but let's stick with what we know - 950k LTD, almost certain to pass a million in January, guaranteed to pass a million in February.

Maybe this is a late reply, but their PR here is fine. North American sales that they refer to include Canada of course, and sales in Canada are pretty much always 1/10 of those of US. So with that in mind, the game must have sold about 1,050M in NA by the end of december, just as they say. But yeah, as you said, by the end of Jan. It should be over 1M in US alone as well.

 

[jercruz]

As of November, it was down 27.8%. I don't think even Nintendo expected to end up down only 5.6%.

still, i can't wait for bloomberg to post their article!

 

[donny2112]

You've been around for long enough.

The quality scale for sales discussion on the internet:
GAF MC threads on regular weeks >
GAF MC threads on bad weeks >
GAF NPD threads on regular months >
"Orbital" GAF sales age threads--publisher sales claims, discussions on million sellers, PR pissing matches >
GAF NPD threads on spectacular months >
Sales discussion anywhere else on the internet.

That's ... a pretty good summation. :lol

 

[RobertM]

God fucking jesus damn Nintendo. If Wii was anything like PS2 support and quality wise, I'd be screaming from the rooftops, but it's not, and that makes me sad.

 

[Flachmatuch]

Yes, I realize EXACTLY what the hell Im saying when I say Nintendo is gobbling up the pie.

"Gobbling up the pie" would mean that they're taking away customers from MS and Sony. They're not doing that, it's just that they're growing their own half of the pie and the rest of the market is not.

Now if they were really "gobbling up the pie", it'd mean they'd be taking away customers from MS and Sony, which would completely contradict everything that people are saying about third parties. If Nintendo can take away customers from third parties it simply means that they're making stuff that people want and that 3rd parties must compete with Nintendo because the buying habits of their core customers are changing. Again, this is not true afaics, but that's what you're implying without really understanding it.

Have you seen ANY actual data from this gen? Do you have ANY clue how large a part of the growth they are? By what margin they are the #1 developer in terms of games sold any pretty much any other metric? Im at a loss as to what exactly you are misinterpreting, it is NO SECRET that Nintendo is cleaning how this gen, and they are far and away in the #1 spot worldwide, NOT in just hardware, they are just flat out cleaning house, with the rest of the luckily successful companies fighting over the rest. Now theres still plenty of money for the rest, but Nintendo commands a vast amount of it.

Obviously. The point is whether it's growing by taking away the market of its competitors - and it's not. It's the traditional part of the industry that's doing really badly, because of lots of bad business decisions and bad market structures. Nothing whatsoever to do with Nintendo. It's not even just about not making use of the new casual market - it's about fucking up their own.

And my definition of healthy is a much more even split than what we have seen. Healthy goes beyond just being profitable. It also takes into account the share everyone involved in the industry is able to take. Your batshit insane if you think the amount of stuidios closing this gen means the industry is healthy, the portions could be spread alot better IMO. And I have no reason to want Nintendo to gain even more than they currently have. A balance as close to 33% on all sides seems that it would benefit me much more than this clusterfuck of nonsense we have going on right now.

An "even split" between the three big platform holders, or five or ten large publishers has nothing to do with "health" whatsoever. "Healthy" means making money and high levels of competition.

According to the first definition, the HD part of the market is not healthy because it's losing money. According to the second, the market is not healthy because it's increasingly controlled by a few large companies. It's getting less and less healthy because of mergers and buyouts, which are, btw, overwhelmingly done by the traditional HD focused publishers.

You might want Nintendo to be less successful, but that has nothing at all to do with "health" and a "healthy market".

I dont even know who the heck your directing this at, your the one who called things 'healthy'. Reminding me about one of the big three bleeding from their main artery this gen isnt doing a whole lot to convince me that things couldnt be much better.

You might recall this:

Shit aint healthy, and these one or two Modern Warfare esque titles a year arent offsetting the massive slice of the pie Nintendo keeps taking every year.

 

[legend166]

still, i can't wait for bloomberg to post their article!

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aBZM_mmqvZd0

 

[AniHawk]

Hey hey! I've been in Reno for three weeks, what'd I miss?

 

[Aaron Strife]

Hey hey! I've been in Reno for three weeks, what'd I miss?

Nintendo sold a lot of consoles but it doesn't matter because dead space extraction bombed.

 

[Dragona Akehi]

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aBZM_mmqvZd0

They obviously fired hans and hired gahiggidy.

 

[Pureauthor]

Hey hey! I've been in Reno for three weeks, what'd I miss?

The birth of modern civilization.